


night owl

by shadowdance



Category: Fire Emblem: If | Fire Emblem: Fates, Fire Emblem: Kakusei | Fire Emblem: Awakening
Genre: F/M, Pre-Canon, kind of, spans fe13 and fe14
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-17
Updated: 2018-06-17
Packaged: 2019-05-24 07:44:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,748
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14950511
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shadowdance/pseuds/shadowdance
Summary: When Severa finds him, his head is tilted up towards the stars.





	night owl

**Author's Note:**

> Found while clearing out my drafts, edited and organized. I think the prompt was "late night talks".

i.

 

The night before they’re supposed to go back in time, Severa finds Inigo on the outskirts, looking at the sky.

“Oh,” she says flatly, and Inigo startles, turning to look at her. He whips his head around in an instant, though; Severa supposes he doesn’t want her to see his face. “What are you doing?”

Inigo has a flower in his hands. Severa isn’t sure where he got it; nothing alive has been springing from the dirt lately. But Inigo’s fingers, when not gripping a sword, are fiddling with petals and stems. It’s as if he has a whole collection of them. “I can’t sleep,” he answers. His voice is steady, almost childlike, and Severa feels a squirm of pity.

“You should at least _try_ to sleep,” she says, feeling uncomfortable. “It’s a big day tomorrow.”

“Rejoining the war,” Inigo says, and there’s a ghost of a laugh in his voice. “From a few years ago, give or take. We aren’t even born.”

“Yeah.”

Silence lapses between them. Inigo shreds petals into nothing; Severa scuffs her foot on the ground. The moon is hidden by a veil of fog, and Severa can barely make out the stars. Everything in this timeline is smog and smoke, hiding everything pretty.

“Do you think we’ll stop it?” Inigo breaks the silence, almost hesitatingly. Severa looks at him.

“What, stop mass destruction?”

Inigo begins to shred the flower again. “No. Stop…this. Stop…my mom. Your mom. From dying.”

A thorn twists and jerks in Severa’s heart. “I mean, that’s why we’re going back, right?”

“I don’t know,” Inigo says, and his voice is exhausted. The petals are all gonefrom his hands. “I just…I don’t know.”

This is Inigo at his vulnerability, at his finest hour. If Severa was meaner, she would use this moment against him, but right now she can only see the broken and lonely boy in front of her. A boy like her. She crosses her arms.

“Go to sleep,” Severa tells him. She glances at the haze, curling over the world. “Just…at least try.”

Inigo sighs and gets to his feet. He squints at the sky. “How late is it?”

Mornings and nights look relatively the same; it’s hard to tell when a day has passed. Severa shrugs. “Lucina’s still asleep, and I don’t see the portal yet.”

“I hope we see the moon again,” Inigo says seriously. His tone is too heavy to just be talking about the moon. Severa bites her lip.

“Me too.”

Inigo brushes past without another word. He leaves sprinkles of petals in his place, shreds of pink on the dirt. Severa casts one look at them, and debates scuffing dirt over them.

In the end, though, she just walks away. Their world needs some color to it.

 

ii.

 

After Grima is defeated, the world is cloudy. It’s not hazy, as it was in the past—the stars and moon shine brighter than the fog, so it looks as if the clouds have wrapped themselves in the sky. It’s pretty and peaceful and that’s why Severa feels as if she needs to _go_. Peace has never been for her. She’s living in the wrong timeline, if she wants _peace_.

She storms outside for a walk and hopes nobody finds her. She finds Inigo, though; he’s staring at the sky with an almost childlike fascination, his eyes wide and lips parted.

“Aren’t you tired?” Severa asks, becauseshe saw Lucina with her head on Cynthia's shoulder, and Noire curled up next to Brady and Yarne; all their friends are taking a well-needed rest. Severa thinks she and Inigo are the only ones awake. Inigo jerks around, hand on his sword, but he relaxes when he sees Severa. A winning smile plasters on his mouth.

“We fought a war before this, Sev. My body is used to this. In fact, I feel lovely.” His voice is coy, the same tone she’s heard when they go into town and he sees a pretty girl. Severa bristles, partly because of the act and partly because the last person who called her _Sev_ was her mother, and she’s the last person Severa wants to think about.

“Can you drop the act, at least? I don’t really _care_ why you’re out here, but don’t act fake around me.”

Inigo’s smile wilts like a flower, and then wanes entirely. He rubs his eyes, and suddenly he looks exhausted. “I’m looking at the moon.”

That’s not the real reason. Severa rolls her eyes, and then looks up. A lot of the clouds have passed over the moon, although she can still see its light.

“Severa,” Inigo says suddenly. “I’m thinking.”

“Congrats,” Severa says flatly. “You want an award?”

“No, no.” Inigo shakes his head. He wipes his eyes again, and Severa wonders if he’s tearing up. “I think I want to go away. Yeah. I think I’m going to go away.”

Severa says, “Oh.”

Inigo scans her face worriedly, searching for a tremor of emotion on her face. But if Inigo is good at hiding his emotions behind a smile, Severa is better at simply hiding her emotions. She keeps her face impassive, and Inigo drops his gaze.

“ _This_ me will never have fought in a war. I think that’s why we fought now, but I don’t know…it’s weird to think about. I don’t think I can stay-”

“Inigo,” Severa interrupts. His reasons are dangerously similar to hers. “I get it. It’s fine. I’m not going to tell Olivia.”

Inigo’s face relaxes.  
  
“I’m not going back, either,” Severa announces, and once it’s out she realizes it’s true. She _can’t_ go back to Cordelia, can’t go back to her mother. There’s a different girl who needs and loves Cordelia. Their name might be the same, but Severa knows she’ll be different from the girl born in this timeline.

Inigo’s eyes widen. “Who is staying, then? Owain wants to go. Cynthia and Morgan are going to go with him. Gerome wants to be alone, probably, and Laurent wants to see the world…” He ticks their friends off his fingers.

Severa shrugs. “I don’t know. Noire, I guess. Maybe Nah.”

Inigo shakes his head and turns back to the sky. Severa shifts on her foot, and tries to follow his gaze, ignoring the ache in her ribs, her heart. Every part of her hurts.

She is so, so tired.

“I can’t see the moon,” Severa says, finally. “It’s too cloudy.”

Inigo smiles—a real smile, the boy behind the mask peeking out. “Really?” He goes behind her and clamps his hands on her shoulders. His palms are warm against her skin. “Here, look this way.”

He moves Severa a little bit to the left, keeping his hands firm on her shoulder. Severa looks up, and right as she does, the last of the clouds drift away from the moon, revealing it in its own glory.

“Can you see it now?” Inigo asks. His voice drifts close to her ear, low and soft. A shiver goes up Severa’s spine.

“Yeah,” she breathes, and then steps away. Inigo’s hands fall off her shoulders. “Yeah, I can.”

 

iii.

 

There is no way to see the moon in Nohr, but it gives room for the stars. The stars shine as bright as they possibly can, like glass littered in the sky. It looks the same as it did in Ylisse, except they’re not in Ylisse anymore and Severa isn’t Severa, just Selena.

But Laslow and Inigo have the same habits. His head is tilted up, admiring the stars, when Selena finds him. She sighs.

“Couldn’t sleep?”

Laslow doesn’t look at her. “You know me quite well.”

Severa would’ve walked away right now, left him to his peace, but Selena feels loneliness and fear stir in her chest. She sidles right next to him, close enough that their arms brush. She follows his gaze, looking at the stars twinkling above them. She can’t find any of the constellations her mother had pointed out.

“Hey,” Laslow says, and she draws her attention to the boy in front of her. His outfit is totally foreign, and his hair is longer, shaggier, bangs falling in his face. The curve of his jaw has smoothened out, and he’s grown a few inches taller.

But when his gaze locks with hers, his eyes are still the same as the boy’s from the doomed future.

“Do you think there’s going to be another war?” Laslow asks. He grips the balcony, staring ahead as if he hadn’t spoken. Selena feels another leap in her heart, but she forces herself to remain calm.

“Don’t be daft,” she replies, although none of her usual venom is in it. Laslow slumps his shoulders.

“Two wars,” he says lowly. “Two wars, we’ve fought _two wars_.” His hands are tight on the balcony and Selena suspects that if he lets go, his hands will start trembling. His eyes are panicked,that same look from years ago. “I’m not sure if I can take another one.”

Odin would know what to say, or maybe he wouldn’t—maybe he’d shoot off his mouth with fancy words, but at least it’d be _something_ comforting. Selena isn’t sure what to say, though. It’s always been her mother who is good at this, not the daughter. Never the daughter.

But she’s not Cordelia’s daughter now, so Selena wraps her fingers around Laslow’s and squeezes tight. “We’ve made it out of two,” she says lightly. “If you _really_ think you can’t make it out of another one, then you must be a lot stupider than I thought.”

Laslow blinks, and Selena wonders if she’s gone too far again. But then his mouth softens in a sweet smile, unexpectedly, and he intertwines their fingers together.

“Still the same as ever,” he says. Selena’s eyebrows shoot up.

“What does _that_ mean?”

“I’m glad you’re here with me.”

Selena lets out a breath. She glances at the stars, pulling her attention away from the boy holding her hand. They really are beautiful.

“Stay,” Laslow suddenly says, and the grip on her hand grows tighter. She looks at him; he smiles again, shyer and softer. It’s quieter, and more earnest than anything else she’s seen. “Just for a little bit.”

Selena looks back at the sky. The stars are cold, glittering above. She moves closer to Laslow, close enough that she can puther head onhis shoulders.

“Okay.”

Laslow's hand is warm in hers.


End file.
